evening during a thunder storm, my eldest brother was inspired to make an unholy experiment. He stood on a sloping rock, which jutted out into the lake near our summer home. Holding his face upward, he defied the Almighty to strike him with a bolt of lightning. The storm was loud and close. The skies opened with a terrifying flash, but the bolt flew across the dark waters a mile away. We felt relieved, foolish, and very insignificant. I have felt unimportant many times since that night and remembered with a smile a bolt of lightning which scorned the Parson’s children.
It took many years to recover from the idea that God was a figure of personal vengeance. Now I think of God as a spirit of goodness, reflected in sane human beings everywhere. In much the same way I look